Looking back: Hand carving workshop

How did it all start?

Two people enthusiastic for marionette making arrived to Prague on Sunday 19th. We managed the accommodation in the same building where the workshop is.

It all started on Monday morning...

It is important to know what kind of marionette you’d like to work on. Each of the participants had an idea of the character of their future marionette. They discussed this with the supervisor Martin Růžička and learned about the process.

The next step was to make a model of the head which was a template for the head hand carved from wood. Moulding is completely different than hand carving. When you mould something, you can add and remove the material as you choose, but when you’re carving from wood, you can only detract. That’s why it’s good to have a sample of the head, because you can see the actual size and you know exactly how much wood to cut off.

And than it was all about hand carving, painting, sharpening.... We started with the head, continued with the body and the legs and arms were the last ones.

Rest

Because it is very exhausting to work on a puppet for the whole week, and once the marionettes are painted, they have to dry for one day, we decided to take our new friends to Marionette Theatre in Pilsen. We watched the performance, met the actors and they took us to the backstage area and showed us the marionettes they use in the theatre.

In the evening we went to a concert on a boat where the puppeteer - supervisor Martin Růžička was playing with his band.

What a relaxing day!

At the end..

After the day off our participants started working on the final completing of their marionettes. All the parts must have been put together and the strings attached.

The results are just wonderful. Two stunning, very personal marionettes! Our new hand carvers brought back home unforgettable souvenir indeed.

What’s going on next?

We are very excited about the results from our first workshop, so we decided to give a chance to the new future hand carvers again soon.